ng so empty, so wretchedly empty, on his
hands. When they were together in these days they found less to talk
about, and had it not been for the Silver Fleece which in magic
wilfulness opened both their mouths, they would have found their
companionship little more than a series of awkward silences. Yet in
their silences, their walks, and their sittings there was a
companionship, a glow, a satisfaction, as came to them nowhere else on
earth, and they wondered at it.

They were both wondering at it this morning as they watched their
cotton. It had seemingly bounded forward in a night and it must be hoed
forthwith. Yet, hoeing was murder--the ruthless cutting away of tenderer
plants that the sturdier might thrive the more and grow.

"I hate it, Bles, don't you?"

"Hate what?"

"Killing any of it; it's all so pretty."

"But it must be, so that what's left will be prettier, or at least more
useful."

"But it shouldn't be so; everything ought to have a chance to be
beautiful and useful."

"Perhaps it ought to be so," admitted Bles, "but it isn't."

"Isn't it so--anywhere?"

"I reckon not. Death and pain pay for all good things."

She hoed away silently, hesitating over the choice of the plants,
pondering this world-old truth, saddened by its ruthless cruelty.

"Death and pain," she murmured; "what a price!"

Bles leaned on his hoe and considered. It had not occurred to him till
now that Zora was speaking better and better English: the idioms and
errors were dropping away; they had not utterly departed, however, but
came crowding back in moments of excitement. At other times she clothed
Miss Smith's clear-cut, correct speech in softer Southern accents. She
was drifting away from him in some intangible way to an upper world of
dress and language and deportment, and the new thought was pain to him.

So it was that the Fleece rose and spread and grew to its wonderful
flowering; and so these two children grew with it into theirs. Zora
never forgot how they found the first white flower in that green and
billowing sea, nor her low cry of pleasure and his gay shout of joy.
Slowly, wonderfully the flowers spread--white, blue, and purple bells,
hiding timidly, blazing luxuriantly amid the velvet leaves; until one
day--it was after a southern rain and the sunlight was twinkling through
the morning--all the Fleece was in flower--a mighty swaying sea,
darkling rich and waving, and upon it flecks and stars of white and
pur